


jumping from the tops of buildings (with you)

by spideysmjs



Series: Make This Feel Like Home [1]
Category: Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Character Study: Michelle Jones, Drabble and a Half, F/M, Heavy Angst, Post-Spider-Man: Far From Home
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-22
Updated: 2020-11-22
Packaged: 2021-03-10 00:40:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,829
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27674819
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spideysmjs/pseuds/spideysmjs
Summary: She hears him mumble something against the top of her head, breath shaking as she tries to zero in on his voice, but the wind is too harsh around her that she can’t hear him. The only resolve she tries to squeeze into her chest is the fact that she’s still here, in his arms, safe.Even if it might be the last time.A hasty goodbye.
Relationships: Michelle Jones/Peter Parker
Series: Make This Feel Like Home [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2027044
Comments: 47
Kudos: 63





	jumping from the tops of buildings (with you)

**Author's Note:**

> inspired by [this video clip](https://twitter.com/marveIstuff/status/1328815827467051008?s=19) from spider-man 3 filming that i haven't stopped thinking about. 
> 
> sorry in advance.
> 
> title from "my beautiful rescue" by this providence.

She’s always lived a mundane life. 

It’s more of a fact than a complaint, knowing that at 16 years old, there’s nothing that demands excitement aside from ridiculous traditions of sweaty school dances, stress acne over the SATs, and graduation – wishing that something, big or small, can make her years more interesting.

The same doesn’t go for Peter Parker: the person she’s squinting at, sunlight beaming from behind him as he crouches on the light post with his hands pressed against his face from shock.

They’d just spent days together in Europe, solving a mystery that saved thousands of people – that little slice of adventure already turning into a whirlwind of events for her.

Now, J. Jonah Jameson continues to grumble about Spider-Man being a _menace_ , spitting out hurtful words, accusing Peter of murder, MJ’s heart beating fast knowing she’d just been seen soaring through the skies of New York City with him.

People will frame him for kidnapping her if she goes with him. 

People might attack her for staying.

Either way is a losing game, her legs have cemented onto the street, face numb from anxiety, heart about to jump out of her chest. 

And then suddenly, his arms scoop her up and her feet are no longer touching anything, both of them back into the sky despite her declaration of never wanting to swing with him ever again. 

Except, this time, there’s too much adrenaline in her veins to be afraid of heights – the only fear running through her mind is what’s going to happen next to Peter… to them. 

MJ buries her face into the crook of his neck, grasps his waist tight with her legs, and keeps her eyes shut as if removing her sight will reverse whatever hell Mysterio’s just released onto Peter's entre life. 

She hears him mumble something, breath shaking as she tries to zero in on his voice, but the wind is too harsh around her that she can’t hear him. The only resolve she tries to squeeze into her chest is the fact that she’s still here, in his arms, safe. 

Even if it might be the last time. 

And, because ~~it might be~~ probably is the last time, MJ’s never wanted anything more than just to make sure these few minutes in the sky with Peter feel longer than the sixteen years she’s spent waiting for something interesting to happen to her. 

_Be careful what you wish for,_ she thinks. The sentiment never made sense to her, not until now. 

MJ doesn’t want to let go the moment her feet touch the ground, still nestled against him, hugging him tight against his body, knowing that the moment she opens her eyes, she has to face the reality that inevitably comes with being with Peter, with _Spider-Man._

Both of them are now one person to the entire world. 

“MJ,” he says, “No one’s followed us. You can let go.”

She doesn’t want to.

“Okay,” she says, loosening her arms, almost pulling away until she feels his hand on the small of her back press against her gently into a softer embrace. 

She doesn’t realize how wet her eyes are until she opens them after their bodies break apart, staring at Peter straight in the lenses of his mask. When he pulls it off, he sighs. 

A chuckle escapes his throat, broken and jagged, but _trying_. “Guess I don’t really need to use that anymore, huh?” 

All she can do is look at him, eyes full of sorrow and uncertainty. She wishes she could say something to make him feel better, but in a world full of superheroes and aliens and otherworldly creatures, what is MJ’s lousy attempt to console him worth? 

“I–I don’t know how this could happen,” he continues, trembling hands still clutching onto the mask that he no longer has the privilege of hiding in. “I didn’t… I didn’t do what that video said, MJ, you have to believe me. I’m not.. I didn’t want him to be.. The drones aren’t–”

“Peter,” she whispers, a soft thing. “I know.”

“You do?” he asks in a way that cracks right in the middle of her heart, just a touch away from the place she keeps him in because to her, Peter’s existence can never escape her. 

“Of course I do.”

“Thank you,” he says. There’s helicopters flying in the distance, sirens wailing down below them, MJ only realizing now that they’d made it. He grabs her hands, pulling her away from the ledge and toward the entrance, beneath a metal awning big enough to hide both of them. 

They lean against the wall, MJ feeling her legs give out as she sinks down, finding her breath that she’d lost ever since the news broke less than half an hour ago, time being suspended like she’d wanted, feeling guilty for wanting this moment to last longer than it should knowing that Peter probably has to go into hiding now, but she doesn’t want to say goodbye. 

It’s absurd how gorgeous the Manhattan skyline looks, nearing sunset with its pinks and purples, almost as if it’s mocking the both of them right now. 

She feels a hand press lightly on her shoulder and as she looks up, Peter smiles down at her, still standing, still finding a way to look confident in the face of distress. 

MJ wishes she could tell Peter that he doesn’t have to be fearless around her. She wishes she could tell him that if she had the choice to run away with him, she would. She’d run away from him and grab that mace she stole from the Crown Jewels and make protecting him her superpowers. But she doesn’t have that choice. She’s powerless. She can’t protect him. 

“Happy already knows where we are. He’s.. he’s sending for you.”

“What do you mean?” she stutters, heat rising in her face knowing that her question probably sounds ridiculous because she already knows the answer.

“I... I have to leave,” he says. “I can’t take you. That’s–that’s too dangerous, MJ.”

She knows. 

“Happy will keep you safe.”

She knows.

“You have to lay low for a while.”

She knows, she knows, she _knows_ but none of this is what she wants. 

“I’ve ruined everything for you.” 

“No,” she says. “No you didn’t, Peter.”

MJ watches him hit his head against the brick wall. “You could have had a normal life, and I had to be sutpid and show off my stupid swinging that you didn’t even like, and now… now I don’t even know what’s going to happen–”

She stands up, facing him. His eyes go wide as she stares into them. “Everything will be okay.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I do,” she says, though the shakiness in her voice doesn’t reassure her certainty. “I do because you’re Peter Parker. You figured it out before and you’ll figure it out again.”

“MJ…”

“And this time… This time I’m here for you,” she says. “With you. Even if I won’t be able to physically be…”

“ _Michelle_ ,” he says – a name he hasn’t said until she’d told him and Ned that they can call her MJ, that they’re friends. Her name in his mouth this time feels different, like a promise that she trusts in him to keep. 

“Peter,” she returns. 

His wrist beeps. “Happy’s almost here.”

_It’s almost time to say goodbye._

There’s so much MJ wants to say, wishing that she can find the words to be honest like she always is, like she always has to be. Somehow, every time she’s around Peter, it’s harder to say what’s on her mind, not wanting to say the wrong thing. 

26 letters in the alphabet, but no combination is good enough for him.

“Okay,” she says. The only word that comes to mind. “We’re – we’re gonna be okay.”

She starts to hear a machine whirring near the side of the building, probably another Stark Industries jet, ready to pick her up. 

Suddenly, at the same time, a siren begins to blare behind them. A harsh sound of feet kicking the door to the roof makes her jump. They both run to the edge of the building where they’d initially landed, MJ’s eyes immediately reaching an open window with someone snickering, phone in their hand like they’d taken a picture. 

She wants to be angry, but there’s no time because Peter begins to panic, arms shaking and flailing as he explains, “I–I didn’t think it would be so soon before we had to–”

“Peter,” she says, feeling so drained of anything despite the needles poking her stomach, begging her to say something else. “Peter, it’s gonna be okay.”

Another slam against the door, and then an endless noise of banging in an attempt to knock it over. 

“I don’t know how I’m gonna get to Happy,” she stares, looking down at the open jet. “Are you coming with me?”

“I can’t."

“Peter.”

“MJ.”

“I don’t want–” she tries, but he interrupts her.

“Do you trust me?”

“Yes. Yes. I do,” she stammers, the same panic from when they’d discovered Mysterio’s true plans on the bridge coming back, but this time at full-force – this time with less knowledge of what’s to come. 

Without responding, he drives toward her, arms open as he holds her and suddenly, they’re in the sky again. 

MJ wishes it could be longer. It feels like she’s forgotten her fear of flying in the short amount of time they’d share together. She could keep flying if it meant being in Peter’s arms longer than the ten seconds it takes for him to carefully land her into the jet.

Happy throws a few capsules – what MJ thinks are web fluid containers – and says, “You know what you have to do, kid?”

“Yeah,” Peter sighs, catching it. He no longer sounds scared, but exhausted – exhaustion that no 16-year-old should ever know. But Peter lives in it. Breathes in it. 

Her heart could break into a million pieces right now thinking of where he’s going to go, what’s he’s going to do – who he has to be. 

“Michelle,” he says again, like a broken record, but she’d rather listen to that noise than anything else. “I…”

“I know,” she says. It could be stupid to already feel this way. She’s sixteen. They’d just kissed once, and maybe they won’t kiss again for a while. But she still feels it, even if she doesn’t say it out loud. “Me too.”

They nod at each other, a reassuring thing. 

“We’re running out of time, Peter. You need to go,” Happy says.

Peter clicks his web-shooters against each other, refilling the fluid. They share one, lasting gaze until he _thwips,_ disappearing into the sky. 

When Happy flies away, she can’t even look back and watch him. 

He’s already gone. They’ve run out of the short time they’d had together. 

And now, the only thing she can do is wait. 

**Author's Note:**

> ........yeah.........
> 
> catch me on [tumblr!](https://spideysmjs.tumblr.com/)


End file.
